Dadlani succeeds Vittorio Cretella, who retires on September 1 after 26 years with the companyShilpa Phadnis | June 20, 2017, 09:27 IST

Sandeep Dadlani, who resigned as president of Infosys last week, has joined Virginia-based confectionery and pet food company Mars as its chief digital officer. Dadlani succeeds Vittorio Cretella, who retires on September 1 after 26 years with the company.

TOI was the first to report, on Saturday, that Dadlani is likely to join Mars. Mars, makers of the brands Snickers, M&M’s, Twix and Wrigley, has net sales of more than $35 billion and comprises of six business segments including petcare, chocolate, Wrigley, food, drinks and symbioscience.

Dadlani will be responsible for working with Mars’ global business segments to drive its digital transformation agenda, while delivering effectiveness and efficiency to its existing technology platforms, the company said. Dadlani is expected to leverage design thinking, new data analytics capabilities and automation.

He will relocate to Mars’ New Jersey offices, and will report into Angela Mangiapane, president of Mars Global Services, and Claus Aagaard, chief financial officer.

Mars CEO and president Grant F Reid said digital is changing the way its customers experience its products and services. “New expectations, competition, distribution channels and opportunities present themselves every day. As we use digital capability to transform our business, we’re delighted that Sandeep Dadlani and George Corbin will bring their depth of expertise in this area.”

Corbin, who worked at Marriott International for 14 years, will join Mars as the chief digital demand officer. He will be responsible for ensuring the Mars e-commerce and digital businesses are an integrated and seamless experience for consumers.

Dadlani joined Infosys in 2001 and was also most recently its global head of manufacturing, retail, CPG (consumer & packaged goods) and logistics verticals overseeing business of $3.5 billion. He joined Infosys when the retail vertical was just $70 million. Analysts said Dadlani may have quit because of the growing pressures on top executives at Infosys to deliver, given a series of unimpressive quarterly financial performance.